Page 70 of Winter Longing
Ailsa grinned and moved her hands around his back, and down over his butt. “Ye have all the best ideas.”
***
“I was never interested in hunting for just this reason,” Tank whispered. “This shit is for the birds.”
Cole grunted softly in agreement. Crouched low behind a cluster of snow-dusted bushes, the cold had seeped into his bones hours ago, and his patience was wearing as thin as the layer of frost on the meadow they overlooked. He was having trouble sitting still for so long as well. He’d kept himself busy by thinking of a million things he’d rather be doing or should be doing.
Eventually, his mind had wandered to Ailsa.
He pictured her as she’d been this morning when they’d parted, the wondrous smile she’d given him when he’d said he’d see her later and he’d winked at her playfully, a suggestive gleam in his eye. Her cheeks had pinkened—God, he loved her blushes.There was something thrilling about coaxing them from her, knowing it was him who made her skin bloom with warmth.
A sharp, muted crack of a twig broke his reverie. One of the men in their party, stationed farther downwind, raised a cautious hand, signaling that the red deer were approaching.
Tank shifted beside him, brushing snow from his knees and squinting out into the clearing where the deer were expected to come. “I don’t even know why we’re here,” he grumbled. “Unless they’re hoping we stab the deer to death.”
Cole agreed with this as well. The deer hunting involved the bow and arrow, a skill in which neither he nor Tank had shown any proficiency yet.
Dersey had snorted a laugh the other day when Tank bugged him for more instruction, had said, “Calm down there, mate. One middling skill at a time.”
Cole proposed now, “Maybe if wearen’tso quiet, we won’t be allowed on these hunts in the future.”
“I like where you’re going with this,” Tank said.
But neither of them made a sound, knowing how far a single stag would go toward feeding Torr Cinnteag.
A moment later, Tank said, “I’m wondering if they’ll shoot me if do make noise and scare off dinner.”
“I wouldn’t put it past them,” Cole answered, almost mechanically.
He didn’t really believe that. Though he still felt that he and Tank were looked upon as outsiders—odd and inept outsiders—they’d made great strides fitting in with the Sinclair men. In a way, it wasn’t so different from what he’d experienced as a firefighter or as a member of the Bandit’s team. Sure, the stakes here were life-and-death in a way his old life couldn’t quite match, but the camaraderie, the good-natured rivalry and ribbing, the way men built bonds by giving each other hellwhile sharing experiences and long hours together—that was the same.
Whether it was hauling hoses through smoke-filled buildings or taking hits on the field for your teammates, there was a mutual respect that grew from those shared experiences. The Sinclairs might wield swords instead of axes or lacrosse sticks, but the way they ribbed each other, the way they worked together when it mattered, that kind of thing was apparently timeless.
A few minutes later, when still not a single deer had yet to emerge into the clearing, Tank shifted again.
“I don’t know how you sit so still for so long,” he said, “but I guess you got something to keep yourself occupied. You were grinning a few minutes ago and I hadn’t said a word, so I guess you’re thinking about your new bride.”
“Might be,” was all Cole allowed, the grin returning, but mostly for how put-out Tank sounded.
“Yeah, I’d be dreaming of her, too, is she were mine. Christ, dude, can you believe it? You’re friggin married,” he whispered dramatically. “In the friggin’ fourteenth century.”
Funny, he didn’t think of it like that. To Cole, he was simply married to Ailsa. And yeah, though the married part was still a shock, the fact that it was Ailsa somehow made it all right. More than all right, actually, since there wasn’t one thing he didn’t like about it. Not one damn thing.
“Pretty soon there’ll be little Coles and tiny Ailsas running all over Torr Cinnteag,” Tank went on, his tone light. “Bugging Uncle Tank for piggyback rides,” he imagined. “Maybe I’ll be able by then to teachthemhow to ride horses and shoot arrows.”
Tank’s words hit Cole hard, knocking the proverbial wind out of him.
“What?” Tank asked, his grin fading as he noticed Cole’s reaction.
Cole shook his head but said nothing, his mind suddenly racing.
Children. Ailsa pregnant.
The thought should have filled him with joy—and a part of him did feel a sudden flash of that—but it also brought with it a tidal wave of dread.
What if she did get pregnant? What if they had a child, and then he... disappeared? Zapped back through time just as suddenly and inexplicably as he’d been brought here? How could he live with himself knowing he might abandon her, leave her to raise their child alone? Worse still, how could he live with not being there to see their child grow up, to guide them, to hold them? The idea clawed at him, tightening his chest.
Cole’s mind flicked back to his mother, to her words in her final days when cancer had stolen everything but her fierce love for him.I’m not afraid of dying, she had said, her voice thin and weak but steady.I’m afraid of not seeing you grow. I won’t get to see the man you’ll become, the life you’ll live. That’s the heartbreak of it.
